


Anticipation

by AerisaHale (KarasuKyra)



Category: Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-08
Updated: 2014-06-08
Packaged: 2018-02-03 22:35:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1758647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KarasuKyra/pseuds/AerisaHale
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint and Natasha have a synchronicity that is hard to achieve.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Anticipation

Clint knows from the moment she walks into his apartment that it was a bad mission. He steers her to a chair and sits her down. Natasha just stares at the floor, not once acknowledging his presence. Her eyes have a vacant look that Hawkeye, unfortunately, knows too well. He saw it after the mission in Bangladesh and again after the mission in Kandahar, and again too many times to count. He wasn’t with her this time, doesn’t know what horror she’s witnessed or had to endure, but he knows what she needs.

Leading her to the bathroom, he keeps a gentle grip on her wrist, silent the entire time. Once there, he starts running a hot bath. He turns her toward him and takes a moment to look her over. He doesn’t see any visible wounds. He tells her to lift her arms and he removes her shirt and then unclasps her bra, slipping it over her arms.

He examines her torso for injuries. He sees a bruise larger than the span of his hand just below her left breast and another dark bruise on her opposite hip. He kneels and unlaces her boots and loosens then enough she should be able to toe them off. He undoes her belt and speaks gently, “Alright, you gotta help me out now, Nat.”

The clouded look in her eyes lifts some and she toes off her boots and pushes her pants and panties down her legs and kicks them off. She then toes her socks off and looks at Clint with a lost expression. He grabs her elbow and turns her to the bath. As she gets in, he shuts off the water and takes a seat on the toilet.

After she’s soaked for a minute she looks at him with eyes clearer than they have been since she arrived. Natasha knows Clint will listen if she wants to speak. The Black Widow knows Clint in ways he hasn’t let anybody in years. They’re relationship—if you can call it that—isn’t what most would call ideal, but it works for them.

The care for each other, and they sleep together, but they also care for and sleep with other people. Clint had spent the other night in Tony Stark’s bed with the lovely bonus of Pepper. As of late, Natasha’s been favoring Maria Hill’s bed. But they always find each other, in the end. There is an intimacy there, that isn’t present with anyone else.

This is what brings Natasha to him when she is so broken. She knows he’ll pick up the pieces of her and put her back together. No questions, no judgements. It is the same thing that brings him to her when he thinks the mission has destroyed him, when he thinks there’s no good left in his soul.

She always manages to coax a light out of him that no one else can. It’s why they work so well together, he thinks. They have a synchronicity that is hard to achieve. Both in battle and out of it. He can anticipate her needs in ways he never thought he’d know another human being.

So, he sat and watched the warmth of the water seep into her bones, watched as she became more and more lucid with each passing breath. He stayed as a solid presence, in this moment, and in her life, and he knew she would offer the same—had offered the same—when the situations were reversed. He didn’t know what she’d seen or been through—this time, his mind whispers—but he knew, he could anticipate and help her all the same.

**Author's Note:**

> I really wanted to portray the depth of their relationship. I believe that they have laid everything to bare between the two of them. I also believe that, while they love each other, they love each other enough to have no jealousy between them, thus enabling them to have other relationships. That's my headcanon, at least.


End file.
